A UK Couple Found Whale Vomit on a Beach — and It's Worth $50,000

A British couple were taking a romantic stroll along a beach one day that reeked of rotting fish when they stumbled upon a grey blob that turned out to be whale vomit. Naturally, they wrapped it up and took it home. The couple is now about to be potentially $50,000 richer.

The Guardianreported that Gary and Angela Williams of Lancashire is currently in negotiations with buyers in France and New Zealand to sell the 3.46 pound lump of whale vomit — a valuable commodity to perfumers due to a waxy substance called ambergris used to preserve the scent of perfumes.

Lancashire couple hoping to cash in on whale vomit windfallhttp://trib.al/KI3XTNk

Ambergris is the product secreted from the sperm whale's bile duct and intestines, and is thought to be a digestive lube for any sharp or rigid objects the whale might have consumed.

Speaking to the Mirror, the couple described the whale vomit's smell as "bad," and a distinctive "cross between squid and farmyard manure." Though its initial smell is wretched, ambergris begins to take on a "sweet, earthy aroma" as it ages, not unlike pine or tobacco.